‘The Walking Dead’ Retro Recap: ‘When the Dead Come Knocking’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

In storytelling, one of the most important and anticipated moments for a reader or a viewer… is when the true intentions and scope of evil that the villain harbors, is revealed. Because not only does that raise the stakes for the heroes, since it is crystal clear now what they are up against, but it truly invests the audience like never before. Because now they too, are fully aware of the capabilities of this monster, and their emotional investment in the story and the characters leaves them worried about what is to come and if their beloved heroes will come to harm and well… this particular moment is top of mind today, simply because the Governor revealed exactly how much evil is in his heart, and how ignorant he is regarding the dead, in the next episode of The Walking Dead.
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A feat that ‘When the Dead Come Knocking’ accomplished, by first revealing that the Governor was playing some dangerous games with science. For he allowed Milton to conduct an utterly wasteful and stupid experiment. Because Milton firmly believed that the dead could potentially retain their intelligence and baseline memories of who they used to be if efforts were made to imprint specific aspects of everyday life upon the brain. But this was a working theory that Andrea knew was a waste of time and that it was dangerous as well. Since it once again, downplayed the raw threat the dead exhibited and of course, she’s seen first-hand that the living dead are nothing more than pure, motorized instinct. But Milton insisted none the less and learned the hard way that he was wrong, and that storyline oddly enough, served as the genuine palate cleanser to some truly ugly moments in this tale.

Because while Milton was playing nice with reanimated corpses, Merle and the Governor, were trying to coax information out of Glenn and Maggie, in the evilest ways imaginable. Because in between his usual racial slurs, Merle resorted to violence and the use of a walker to try and get Glenn to talk and when that didn’t work… the Governor resorted to intimidation and threats of sexual assault toward Maggie to get intel and when that didn’t work, he simply threatened lives to get what he wanted and well, it doesn’t get more evil than that. Since those actions made it clear that the Governor really doesn’t care about anyone or anything outside of having complete control over a situation or people, and if he doesn’t have control over someone… he will uncover their weakness through any means necessary to obtain it, and it was definitely in this moment, that we came to understand how evil this man is and how far he will go to further his agenda.

But thankfully, not all was lost in this particular tale. Because our heroes were making plans all along to rescue their loved ones. For Michonne was let into the prison when it became obvious, she wouldn’t survive out there in the land of the dead, and once her wounds were tended to, and the lack of trust that existed between her and Rick was resolved… she revealed how she got the formula and what became of Glenn and Maggie. Which motivated Rick to put together a search and rescue party, one that ran into a great deal of trouble on their way to Woodbury since the dead were everywhere. But eventually, they made it and came face to face with the gates and that’s where this episode leaves us, with our heroes on the verge of taking Woodbury by utter surprise to get their people back.

If anything, this was one quality and amazing tale. Because not only did this episode do a flawless job of exposing the Governor’s evil soul and outright ignorance, but it did so in such a compelling and powerful manner… that this story still leaves you uncomfortable after all these years. Because that scene with Maggie is just disgusting and twisted and it makes you hate the Governor like never before, and while some might see that moment as one that goes too far, it is the right way to really express the depravity of the character and that does up the ante for certain. Thankfully though, the show would eventually make amends for making us sit through that, and it would start its apology off… by making the Governor go through a well-deserved emotional and physical wringer, in the next episode. Until then.   

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